Friday, February 09, 2007

Arguement Against Anarchy 4

A common charge against anarchocapitalism is that it's "too extreme". Ignoring the fact that this completely fails to refute anything whatsoever, let's look at the charge anyways.

On any particular issue there are five possible things government can do.

1. Prohibit2. Regulate3. Ignore4. Subsidize5. Mandate

This is how it works on every issue. They can do more than one of them, but they must be doing at least one.

Some people want the government to prohibit drugs. This is obviously an extreme policy.Some people want the government to regulate drugs. While not an extreme policy, it is not moderate either.Some people want the government to ignore drugs. This is the middle-of-the-road policy.Some people want the government to subsidize drugs. Not extreme, but not moderate.Some people want the government to mandate drugs. This is obviously an extreme policy.

What's the most moderate policy? Obviously, it's to ignore drugs. This is a moderate's policy.

Some people want the government to prohibit people from protecting themselves.Some people want the government to regulate self-defense.Some people want the government to ignore it.Some people want the government to subsidize it.Some people want the government to mandate it through police.

What's the most moderate policy here?

If you're going to be a consistent moderate, you have to take the position that the government should ignore every issue. In other words, become an anarchocapitalist. Ironic? Yes. If you are going to be completely consistent and never violate the principle of being moderate, anyways. Then you'd have to become an extremist in the pursuit of moderation.

This is when many people come to the realization that it is necessary to harness the power of doublethink to make the point that you need to be moderate in the pursuit of moderation. Of course, the only way to do that is to become more extreme.

Either moderation contradicts itself, or does not contradict anarcho-capitalism.

Have fun trying to work your way out of the trap you set for yourself.

6 Comments:

This is MustangGT, the new user guy at RRS. I found your blog via the official anarchy thread at the RRS forums. Just to let you know, I also got an anarchist blog at http://radicallibertarians.blogspot.com.

Im totally adding your blog to my blog roll. Im gonna surf through your archives too and get to readin em. So far the writing that Ive read from you is great. Kudos, my friend :)

I don't remember the source, but around late fall last year someone revealed that Somalia greatly improved in a number of key areas since the fall of their government in the mid-90's and the onset of anarchy.

I understand that key services such as running water, telecommunications and more greatly improved.

The purpose of the study was to show that anarchy can be much better than a bad government.

Hope you can find it and that you find it interesting. It would be a great topic for your blog.

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